


I am Huntress Wizard

by blivengo



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types
Genre: Based On a D&D Game, D&D Backstory, Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition, Fantasy, Gen, RPG, Roleplaying Character, Science Fiction & Fantasy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-19
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-25 13:41:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14978342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blivengo/pseuds/blivengo
Summary: A child, cast out for being different, joins forces with her adoptive mother to break tradition and fight off an encroaching evil.





	I am Huntress Wizard

                It had been nearly three generations. The elders in the Whisper Wilds were debating rather a curse had been lifted, or if the village’s increased involvement in the larger world had damned them when the shriek of Medoula, the midwife, stunned them into silence.

                “It’s happened,” said Elder Tanneth, simply. There was a round of grunts and nods from the rest of the venerable gathering, and Tanneth reached up gingerly with her swollen, arthritic hand to clang a chime suspended over her head by weed-woven twine that looked like it may give at any moment. A young man entered the Hall of Elders and immediately bowed, making sure not to dishonor his position by meeting any of the elders’ gaze.

                “Go to Medoula; bring us the child.” Somehow, the young man bent lower, and then dashed out the door without a sound. “Darna, Shebbis – make preparations,” Tanneth paused, her eyes seeming to cloud with thought, then went on, “hopefully Zametra is still able to take on her burden.”

*******

                Darna and Shebbis shambled up the overgrown path with the newly born, newly named, and soon-to-be cast out Zamindaris Wuthers trailing behind them in a travois they both pulled. If all went according to plan, and nothing impassible lie before them on the way that hadn’t been traveled for decades, the two elders would be making the return trip before darkness fell.

                Already breathing heavily, Shebbis stopped short, turned to Darna, and said, “we could just leave the verdant thing here.”

                Darna glowered, “that will remain within the trees, but mind your words,” she hunched and looked about as if searching for eavesdroppers, then muttered almost under her breath, “do you think we call our land such because it sounds pretty?” As if to accent her point, the wind shifted with an uncanny shushing sound. The two elders exchanged a glance, and then wordlessly doubled their efforts, suddenly in a hurry to be finished with their drudgery.

                Though they nearly lost the path several times because Mother Nature had been working on it much more than the villagers had, they made it to the dilapidated hut while the sun still hung in its downward arc. As they’d been instructed, they leaned the travois against the hut, bowed toward it, and spoke the traditional chant in unison: “From ours came yours, and we deliver to thee – from body, to seed, into leaves, last to tree.”

                Standing, Shebbis said, “Now, let’s get ba—”

                “Why has it been so long?” A voice appeared to echo from everywhere, cutting the woman short.

The two elders looked around, then to each other. Shebbis showed fear in her wrinkled face, but Darna spoke clearly, “this is the first since your time, Zametra.”

“Do you forget the way until you wish to remove a child from your simple village?” This time the voice was coming distinctly and deliberately from behind them, down the path.

Fear was prickling its way through both elders now, nearly incapacitating Shebbis who had gasped and grabbed at her chest. Darna, in a now slightly trembling voice, replied, “That’s…that’s not the way. You know the wa—”

“Damn you all, and your ways!” Zametra came forward at this, catching the light through the tree boughs and showing her bark-like skin and tangle of vine and ivy hair. When she walked, her toes became roots, plunging into the ground and pulling her forward before being pulled as she lifted her foot for the next step. The two elders collapsed into each other, embracing. “Go back to your village and keep pretending what you do is somehow good and just. Go!” Zametra shouted the last word and pointed back toward the village, grinning as the elders all but tripped over themselves to flee. _This will be the end of this. This child will not prolong this cycle._

*******

                Over the next several years, Zametra raised Zamindaris as she was bade by the _ways_ of the village, supposedly passed down from the original Elementals that had once lived in harmony with the ancient clutch of humans – but she cast out their strict doctrine of passive subservience to the land, and taught Zamindaris the martial traditions of the forest, the mixture of survival knowledge and magic that had always been locked away in each of their kind. Zamindaris took to the bow and arrow like a natural, training to nock and shoot at the same time she was taking her first steps and learning to speak.

                The young sapling, as Zametra often called her, grew up with a lot of questions, and Zametra did her best to be open and honest with her, telling her about the village and their ancestry. In addition, she told young sapling at the ripe age of eleven that the reason she’d made the decision to raise her as a wild huntress wasn’t just because she could no longer stand the disgusting manner in which the villagers shooed away their Elemental nature, but also because, slowly, for as long as Zametra could remember, a blight had been encroaching on the Whisper Wilds.

                An astute, inquisitive child, young sapling asked, “but isn’t that the natural order of things? The cycle?”

                The corner of Zametra’s mouth curved into a wry smile as she said, “this is true, yes, most of the time, but there’s evil afoot with this…” She trailed off as if she’d lost her train of thought, but, in truth, another thought had elbowed its way into first position. “Plus, I’ve never told you why these are called the Whisper Wilds, have I?”

                “There’s more to it than a name?”

                Zametra nodded, “you’ll find there’s often something special behind every name. In this case, they’re named for the whispers of our ancestors that still live here, and, hopefully, always will – always if we stop that blight, that is.”

                Zamindaris’s face contorted into confusion as she contemplated this. After a few moments’ thought that didn’t reveal the answer she was searching for, she asked, “what do you mean they still live here? Are they buried amongst the trees?”

                Zametra considered this, then replied, “in a way, yes – our ancestors _are_ the trees.” She allowed young sapling time to process this before continuing, “as we age, our human component eventually dies, and all that remains is our Elemental selves.” Zametra raised her arms, attempting a gesture to encompass the vastness of the forest. “When this happens, we take root where we are and carry on. Here, in this place, we are literally surrounded by our family tree, and I would like to keep it that way.”

                Looking up with a renewed awe at the majesty of the tall trees that she now knew to be her relatives, Zamindaris said, simply, “yes,” in a voice choked with wonder.

                Zametra plucked a leaf from the antler-like branches growing from young sapling’s head and smiled, a confident expression that also held a measure of sadness. She held the small leaf up until it eclipsed the sun that shone through the cover of their people, and then let it fall, watching as it drifted listlessly to the forest floor. “And we will, young sapling,” she said, patting the girl on the shoulder, “we will.”

*******

                Several years passed before the signs of the blight encroached close enough to the Whisper Wilds for Zametra to admit they could wait no longer. In what was a surprise twist for Zamindaris, she was told she would be venturing out to meet whatever cursed thing was slowing dragging its repugnant rot toward them alone – Zametra would be staying outside the hut to convene with the Elementals and grant a powerful boon on Zamindaris.

                Eager to be off, Zamindaris gave a quick bow to the only person she’d ever really known, the person she’d always thought of as a mother as well as a teacher and caretaker, and set off at a quick trot, moving effortlessly through the dense brush away from her home. By the time she stopped to camp for the night, the grey, ashy blight was almost everywhere. _This is too close, much too close. We couldn’t have waited another day._

                She was busy clearing the dead, tainted plant matter from where she’d planned to sleep when a large branch from somewhere directly above her dropped too fast, almost landing on top of her. She teetered backward after the near miss, eventually losing her balance and falling hard on her back. Before she had time to gather herself and attempt to ascertain what had just happened, another branch was swinging down toward her head. _This is it! Zametra, the time is now!_

                Zamindaris rolled left, sprang to her feet, and darted for her bow and quiver. Had the blight been smarter, it may have thought to demolish its foe’s weapons once the sneak attack had failed, but, luckily for Zamindaris, intelligence wasn’t one of its main attributes. Once she’d armed herself, she felt a quiet calm sink in: her breathing slowed, her eyesight sharpened, and her sense of touch was so heightened that the slightest change to the ground or air felt like a rumble or a breeze. _This is the boon! Fight with me, mother Zam, for the Wilds!_

                Imbued with a power she could scarcely contain, Zamindaris kicked backward off the ground, flipping high in midair as she nocked two arrows simultaneously. Aiming for the dead holes near the top of the now obviously animated tree, she took a deep breath and let loose her volley along with a guttural scream in a strange language she had no cause to understand but, somehow, did. Her arrows were true as ever, and the thing let out a sort of screech that sounded like twigs snapping and echoing down an empty cavern. The blight scratched blindly at its face, trying to pluck the arrows from its vision, but Zamindaris had advantage and she would not be denied victory.

                She landed with feline grace and immediately soared up the nearest tree, jumping and hauling herself up branches with the ease of a squirrel. When she’d reached what would be eyelevel with the wicked abomination she was facing, she perched on a stable limb and jumped straight over top of it. As she went, Zamindaris slammed arrow after arrow after arrow into the hollowed top of the tree blight, cursing in her newfound tongue with each thwip of her bowstring. The unnatural evil grabbed at the sides of its would-be head and cooed, a strange, bird-like call that nearly made Zamindaris feel sorrowful until the sound splintered into a rage-filled cracking as the blight literally tore itself apart from the top trying to get to the arrows that were piercing the hidden demon that had brought it to life. But, before it could succeed, whatever had possessed the tree perished. And, so did the blight.

                Triumphant, Zamindaris broke off the hand of the now-brittle tree creature as a prize to show Zametra, and, without resting, made her way to her mother figure. Though the night was cool and almost pitch, she made it, safe and sound, as the sun was just starting to warm the morning dew. She was about to shout for Zametra, hoping she hadn’t wandered too far in her morning chores, when young sapling noticed a new tree growing straight and tall less than a dozen paces from the mouth of the hut. Zamindaris knew, instantly, this was Zametra. Her caretaker, her teacher – her mother, had parted with her humanity, probably during the confrontation, the granting of the boon being too much for that kind of fragility to bear. Zamindaris sank to her knees, dropping her prize, and wept.

                A warm wind that carried the fragrance of wildflowers from no meadow nearby caressed young sapling’s face, drying her tears, and she began to hear a low chorus of hundreds, maybe thousands, of voices all singing their own hymns in what should have been a cacophony but came out in brilliant harmony.

                Zametra’s voice rose above the song, “this is not a time to be sad, Zamindaris, my young sapling.”

                Zamindaris gasped. Gingerly, she raised her arm and placed her palm on the tree before her. It was still warm, just as Zametra’s bark-like skin had always been. She leaned forward, resting her forehead against Zametra’s would-be thighs as she had many times when she was still a child.

                “I am not lost, quite the opposite – you have saved us all, just like we knew you would.” The arboreal song reached a crescendo as the wind wrapped itself around Zamindaris like an embrace. As it subsided, she heard Zametra’s voice once more, “now, go. There is nothing for you here but a life of waiting, maybe for nothing – use your skills, your talents, and make something for yourself. Make us proud. If you come back to be planted, so be it; if not,” Zametra’s tone pitched as if she were grinning, “then the Whisper Wilds will be that much bigger.”

*******

                Days later, Zamindaris was looking back on the old hut, the tree that was Zametra, and the rest of the Whisper Wilds for the last time. Having saved her ancestors from the fate of the blight, she decided to carry on Zametra’s wishes of not continuing the cycle of playing host to the next outcast the villagers would bring. Before departing, she dragged an old stump into the way of the path, and set the tree blight’s hand upon it, pointing them back the way they came. Zamindaris was fairly certain they’d get the message.

                In the months and years that followed, Zamindaris made a name for herself as a wandering archer, making a living by winning contests wherever she found them. She was satisfied with this lifestyle for a time, but knew, deep in her heart, she was meant for more – the tree blight of the Whisper Wilds wouldn’t be the last monstrosity she removed from the realm…


End file.
